Bit of Fluff
by ardavenport
Summary: Qui-Gon makes friends. Obi-Wan is amused.


**Bit of Fluff**

by ardavenport

"Aaaaaah, I see they have not arrived yet." Qui-Gon's Vleston guide surveyed the empty room with his silvery eyes. "If you will be so kind, Master Jedi, to wait here? I will find them." He spoke softly, with a slight hiss to his otherwise perfect standard.

Qui-Gon nodded. "Of course. I will be happy to wait here," he agreed. The guide touched his shiny, steel-blue scaled forehead and bowed.

"I will not be long." He left to go find Obi-Wan and the other guide. The door slid closed behind him.

It was a pleasant waiting room, with a skylight overhead, a gray tiled floor, plants in the corners and padded benches along the dark paneled walls. In one corner was a table with a large tray of refreshments.

Qui-Gon strolled over to a decoratively screened entrance to an interior garden, but surprisingly it did not slide open for him though it clearly was a doorway. Peering through the gaps in the curling latticework, Qui-Gon saw a large area of green ground covering plants and bushes shaded by several large trees that rose up high over the roofs of the buildings.

Wrinkling his nose, Qui-Gon detected a faint animal smell. Among the plants he spied furry creatures in varying combinations of blue and brown and white. The garden was an enclosure for sepur. From their small size, Qui-Gon presumed that they were young ones, not long separated from their mothers.

The Jedi had heard little about the creatures before arriving on H'flurz, but while reviewing the Vleston's adherence to their treaty with their sister world, Qui-Gon had heard and seen quite a bit more. They were highly favored in Vleston society both as pets and working animals. The adult creatures, the largest reaching only up to Qui-Gon's knees when standing, were highly disciplined, well trained and eager to please their masters. The Vlestons took great pride in their sepur companions and conversations about them always elicited smiles.

The sepur kits played among the plants in small groups of little fluff balls that would soon grow up into the well mannered and perpetually happy adults that Qui-Gon had observed. A few lazed in patches of sunlight. Asleep, their bodies were little furry tubes with a big bulge in the middle and long tufts of hair at either end. Four evenly spaced limbs, two arms and two legs, stubby with long narrow fingers, were tucked close to one end of the center bulge. At the other ends, their little eyes and mouth holes were all but invisible amidst long hair and thick patches of whiskers.

It was a splendid garden. Qui-Gon smiled and then turned back to the refreshments.

The Vlestons ate two huge meals a day, early in the morning and late in the day and it was considerate of them to accommodate their Jedi guests who preferred more frequent and smaller ones. Qui-Gon poured water from an orange pitcher into a matching cup while he tasted a few savory finger foods and munched some vegetable sticks. They were all excellent. He picked out a large bright green puff ball on a stick. It was light and melted in his mouth with a burst of sweet and sour flavors and he quickly finished it in a few bites.

Beep, beep, beep, beep!

Qui-Gon turned toward the sound of scrabbling and beeping to see a small white sepur kit peeking in at him. It had jumped up onto the latticework and now clung to it with the blunt claws on the long fingers of its arms. It pressed its flat face into the opening it clung to, but it was too big, though the long whiskers around its mouth hole poked through the barrier.

Laying the empty stick aside, Qui-Gon smiled and went to his new admirer.

"Hello," he said, crouching down to the kitling's level. "I don't think you're supposed to be up there." The little sepur snuffled and tried harder to get through.

"Aaaaaah," Qui-Gon held up a warning finger and the sepur immediately fixated on it. "There's much more fun for you outside with your friends. It would be very dull and boring for you in here." The whiskers twitched and the two round dark eyes stared back in confusion. Qui-Gon's Force influence only created a contradiction for the little sepur since it could see that there was something new and interesting right there in front of it. He sighed. A suggestion of fear would have it immediately scurrying away, but Qui-Gon simply did not wish to scare the creature.

"I shall leave you to think about it," he said, now projecting a sense of novelty passing and things being better outside in the garden. He rose and went back to the table. With his back to the latticework, he picked up his water and sipped. He could feel the sepur watching him, but with fading interest. He picked up a bowl of berries and little round red fruits and sampled a few.

Sh-sh-sh-shrich. Cri-cri-cri-crack.

The bowl did not make it back to the table as Qui-Gon whirled and flew back to the barrier, his hands catching the sepur as if fell forward over a broken and now jagged curve of the lattice. One hand supporting the squirming sepur, Qui-Gon's finger broke off the rough edges under it. The sepur's body bulge came through easily. It filled his palm with its leg and arm fingers flailing for a grip on something. Kneeling, Qui-Gon held it up, supporting it with both hands. Long foot fingers curling over their new perch, the sepur righted itself.

Beep-beep, it said in a voice that would someday descend to the low-toned honking of the adult sepur. The kitling stretched its face toward Qui-Gon's, its mouth hole opening and closing rapidly.

Qui-Gon smiled down at it. "I'm sorry, but I don't want to teach you any bad manners that your masters will complain about later. And you look very well fed otherwise." Though the kitling looked like it was mostly white, fluffy hair, its little body had some weight to it. Sepur were omnivorous and he had seen Vlestons benevolently feed them from table scraps, but only after they obediently waited for the end of a meal. This one was obviously too young to be trained and it now begged shamelessly. The sepur's whiskers lowered in its very best attempt to look forlorn and thin.

As a consolation Qui-Gon brought it close, cradling it next to his shoulder. Feigned hunger immediately forgotten, the sepur snuggled up to him, while Qui-Gon stroked the soft downy fur. The warm little body rumbled with contentment.

Chew! Chew!

Little clouds of white fuzz floated out from the sepur when it sneezed. There was now an outline of hazy white on Qui-Gon's dark brown robe where it pressed next to him. Presumably growing out of its juvenile coat, the kit was shedding badly.

A new scratching sound snapped Qui-Gon's attention back toward the opening in the broken lattice. A pair of blue dots, surrounded by blue and brown mottled fur, stared back at him.

The Force pushed back at it from Qui-Gon's open palm. The newcomer pulled back as if it were in a stiff breeze, but it's blunt claws hung on as if its life depended on staying. Qui-Gon did not wish to push any harder or it would go shooting back into the garden and possibly be injured. As soon as the invisible pressure was gone, it eagerly wiggled through the opening into Qui-Gon's hand. He quickly brought it up to nestle next to the first one and then put his fist in the breach to keep the next one from coming through. Several more beeped and probed the ground at the base of the latticework.

At this point, Qui-Gon's choices seemed to be to wait until the guide came back with Obi-Wan or put the two he had down and get to the door before they or any of the others could follow and then find an attendant.

A new cracking sound drew his alarmed attention to a corner of the lattice barrier. A piece came away and a tan ball of fur came through. It ignored him and went straight for a red fruit on the floor. But it was too big for the kit's mouth hole and it rolled away with the sepur chasing it.

Qui-Gon immediately saw the danger. If the kit could not break the fruit's tough skin, then it could choke on it. Sepur had no teeth and this one did not seem coordinated enough to use its claws to catch and smash it. Still cradling the two he had, Qui-Gon stood and ruthlessly began stomping on every errant fruit scattered over the floor. More sepur came in through the new opening while others plopped down from the first one.

Some went straight toward the splattered pile of berries while others just explored the room, or probed the flattened fruits with their whiskers. There were too many of them by the door for Qui-Gon get out without a few of them escaping, too. And now others, knowing where the rest of the food was, excitedly hopped, trying to catch the edge of the table, which tilted ominously.

Qui-Gon put his two sepur down and backed up to a wall.

"Stop this now, or I will eat you all!" he commanded and waved his arm toward the whole room.

The sepur squealed together in terror. A few of them scurried back out through the ground opening and spread the alarm in the garden. But unfortunately most of them just panicked and rushed into a corner.

Qui-Gon's shoulders slumped as he looked back at the terrified little eyes. They clustered tightly together into a clump of multi-hued fur balls. But at least no new ones were coming in anymore. He knew that the sensible thing to do would be to go and look for an attendant, but Qui-Gon could simply not leave them in such a state.

He slowly went to the center of the room and crouched. The sepur kits watched every motion. Quite convinced that he was going to eat them, their long narrow fingers clutched each other and they pressed even more tightly together. Fear was a quick but an unpredictable influence at best, but even worse, it was cruel.

"I'm not going to eat you." He spoke calmly, casting a peaceful influence toward them. The clump loosened up a bit. "But I really need you to behave." A few sepur looked about as if trying to remember where the danger was. "And I'm sure you all must be very tired from having so much fun." Still in a crouch, hand out to them, he moved closer. A few drew back, but most followed his hand, mesmerized. "And it would be a very good idea for you all to take a nap now after all that excitement." This last influence came out as a whisper. Some sepur stretched out on the floor, while the rest stayed together, their whiskers sleepily lowered over the dots of their eyes.

Something landed on Qui-Gon's back.

Startled, he jumped back, but the sepur he had missed enmeshed itself in the hood of his robe.

Beepbeepbeepbeepbeep!

He got his hands on the squirming little body on his back, but he couldn't reach it through the fabric, at least not with his robe on. The sepur in the corner began to revive, some of them separating from the clump. A new one came in from the garden.

Qui-Gon shrugged out of one sleeve and began pulling the robe around so he could get at the hood.

The door slid open and Qui-Gon turned toward it.

"Oh no!" Obi-Wan's guide exclaimed, rushing in. Qui-Gon's twenty-something Padawan followed and the door closed again. Obi-Wan was tight-lipped, his merriment showing only in his eyes.

The table behind Qui-Gon crashed to the floor amidst a chorus of jubilant beeping.

"Oh no, oh no, oh no!" The guide looked about frantically at the now feasting mob of sepur. More were coming in from outside. Qui-Gon finally got his hands on the furry kit in his hood and held up a happy little pale blue sepur with white spots. He set it down on the floor and let it join the others in the frenzy.

"I believe you have a problem with your gate," he said to the guide, rising again and folding his arms before him, his robe still hanging off of one arm and shoulder.

"Oh, that should have been replaced ages ago," the guide moaned unhappily toward the breached lattice, more sepur still leaking through it. She looked quite torn about what to do, her scales flushing blue.

"We can wait here while you go to get help," Qui-Gon told her politely, giving her an excuse to leave. "I'm sure our little friends will be no more trouble." All the sepur clustered and jumped around the fallen table and it's spilled refreshments, leaving none near the door.

The guide hesitated, perhaps imagining what 'more trouble' might look like, before she touched her forehead, bowed to them and hurried out.

Obi-Wan let his huge grin show. Qui-Gon sighed.

"You've been making good friends, Master," Obi-Wan commented, looking down at a few fluffy sepur kits chasing some scraps that had scattered in their direction.

"That is quite enough, Padawan," Qui-Gon admonished, but with little energy. He seriously doubted that there would be any diplomatic fallout from this misadventure, only embarrassing stories about the Jedi Master defeated by a pack of kitlings. Obi-Wan moved closer to him; he slid his feet on the floor to avoid stepping on any strays.

"They're very cute," Obi-Wan commented. He brushed the film of fine white hairs on Qui-Gon's robe. "And very soft and furry." Qui-Gon frowned, but his Padawan was undeterred. His hand suddenly darted upward. It came away with a tiny bit of bright green, a bit of fluff from the desert Qui-Gon had eaten that had been sticking to his beard all along. Obi-Wan's grin broadened.

"But not, I think, green?"

**V/A\\V/A\\V/ - - END - - V/A\\V/A\\V/**

(This story was first posted on tf.n - 29-April-2007)

**Disclaimer:** All characters and situations belong to George and Lucasfilm; I'm just playing in their sandbox.


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